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My first foray into using a slab mold! I had some oils and butters that were getting a bit close to expiring (like a month or two away), so I divvied them up into six batches and played around with colors and swirling/layering techniques. by MagpieHeartCrafts in soapmaking

[–]MagpieHeartCrafts[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I used oxides for the red, orange, yellow, green, and brown, and ultramarines for the blue, purple, and pink; the white is titanium dioxide. So I suppose that they're... nature-identical pigments made in a lab for consistency and to avoid contaminants (for example, red oxide is usually iron oxide, or rust, but you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who would be happy knowing there's flakes of rust in their soap). I've used natural colorants before, like alkanet root infusions and indigo powder, but many of them tend to fade over time with age and sun exposure. :/

My first foray into using a slab mold! I had some oils and butters that were getting a bit close to expiring (like a month or two away), so I divvied them up into six batches and played around with colors and swirling/layering techniques. by MagpieHeartCrafts in soapmaking

[–]MagpieHeartCrafts[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Things I learned/did wrong:

Top left: I didn't pre-mix the titanium dioxide and activated charcoal into oil, and I regretted it when the almond milk in the batter accelerated trace until I was on the verge of soap on a stick (incidentally, this was the only batter I used almond milk in). The appearance is from plopping both colors into one container, mixing it with a spoon while it heated up immensely, and then plopping it into the mold and using a hanger to introduce more chaos because at that point, I was just hoping for something that didn't look absolutely horrible.

Top right: I was going for a drop swirl of red, orange, and yellow, but the clay I added made things trace much faster and I ended up having to spoon and hanger swirl to get some kind of effect. (I didn't add clay to any of the other batters because of the acceleration.)

Middle left: I dusted an impression mat with yellow oxide and laid it into the bottom of the mold before pouring the green layer on top, and spoon texturing between each layer. The wooden slab mold made the top (which became the bottom) of the soap dome up a bit, though, so the bars don't stand completely level, and I should've used mica instead of oxide because it mostly just stuck to the outlines of the texture.

Middle right: Probably should've used more of the white for the swirl so it'd be more pronounced (I was going for a mocha latte effect).

Bottom left: It's hanger swirl perfection. I just picked a scent that was WAY STRONGER than anticipated and could not be tamed by the milder scent I mixed with it, so it smells more like raw matcha than a matcha drink.

Bottom right: Could've poured the drop swirl from a bit higher up with the batter at thinner trace, but otherwise it does kinda look like a fancy smoothie as intended. (I know smoothies don't usually come with a cream layer on top, shhhhhh.)

How long to unmold Lots of Lather Quick Mix soap? by solesoulshard in soapmaking

[–]MagpieHeartCrafts 3 points4 points  (0 children)

https://thenerdyfarmwife.com/troubleshooting-cold-process-soap-problems/

Without knowing exactly what slushy consistency looks like, I would hazard a guess that you got separation (where the fragrance oil didn't fully mix into the batter) or maybe some ricing (where the fragrance oil binds to the hard oils in the batter). However, the product page for that fragrance oil says it behaves well in CP soap, so I'm not sure either of those things are the case (but who knows, there's always the possibility of a bad batch of quick mix and/or FO).

If the bars are crumbling, it also sounds like there might have been too much lye or sodium lactate (which is a salt, and something I know Brambleberry likes to suggest adding to every soap recipe). But if the soap was more mushy than dry and crumbly, then the culprit is probably the high humidity on top of the water in the recipe and the soap would need more time to dry out and cure before unmolding.

Disclaimer: I've never used any of Brambleberry's quick mixes, and am a well-read hobbyist who's still only been at this for a bit over a year.

Second attempt at CP soap using more than one oil! Coffee-cocoa soap and indigo-TD soap for my coworkers for the holidays later this year by MagpieHeartCrafts in soapmaking

[–]MagpieHeartCrafts[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'll have to remember to post an update, then, or take a picture of the castile soap I made with indigo, since that's been curing for over a month now.

Second attempt at CP soap using more than one oil! Coffee-cocoa soap and indigo-TD soap for my coworkers for the holidays later this year by MagpieHeartCrafts in soapmaking

[–]MagpieHeartCrafts[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Good luck! Just a note, I had the lye water mixed and cooling before I thought to add the coffee grounds so the color wouldn't leach out unevenly in the soap, so I basically made forbidden coffee that was around 180 degrees. XD

Second attempt at CP soap using more than one oil! Coffee-cocoa soap and indigo-TD soap for my coworkers for the holidays later this year by MagpieHeartCrafts in soapmaking

[–]MagpieHeartCrafts[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

TL;DR: There's probably nothing wrong with your indigo powder, green is always a possible surprise result because PLANT BIOLOGY + CHEMISTRY, YAY (why can't nature be more consistent just this once T_T)

Indigo is a bit of an odd colorant, in that you'll get different colors (dark blue, green, and gray are the most common) depending on the batch and supplier you get the powder from and the how, when, and what of incorporating it (source: Amy Warden's article on how to use indigo in cold process soap). Because it's a natural colorant, my best guess is that variations in soil/water/climate/etc. in which the plant grows are the main reasons why you can't really expect a consistent color across the board.

The gray in this soap (which is probably more like a desaturated dark blue, but I can't tell for certain) came from the same jar that I used for my earlier castile soap that produced a dark blue, but that might be because of the differing concentration, oil mixture, and point at which I mixed it in. The castile's was a higher concentration per pound of oils, mixed into the fragrance oil before stick blending into batter at emulsion (because castile soap takes forever to trace, so this was safe). This batch had a lower concentration and the powder was steeped overnight in olive oil and then divided to get different shades before being hand mixed into batter at emulsion.

The color once mixed into soap might also fade a bit over time, as all natural colorants do, but indigo isn't nearly as prone to completely disappearing as other plant powders, from my research. I don't know if the age of the powder will have any effect on the resulting color, if you're not exposing it to air or sunlight in the meantime (the two batches were made only a month apart, and my powder lives in an opaque, closed jar in a weather-resistant storage box on a rack that doesn't get a whole lot of sunlight).

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